(CNN) Slide focus now on relief efforts
Wednesday, February 22, 2006 Posted: 0603 GMT (1403 HKT)
"The Red Cross right now is slowly shifting into … relief mode, addressing people who have been evacuated from the area, providing them mass feeding," said Richard Gordon, the head of the Philippine National Red Cross, Richard Gordon.
The Associated Press reported that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo visited the headquarters of the relief operation, about one kilometer (0.6 miles) from Guinsaugon. She received a briefing from the provincial governor, shook hands with U.S. Marines and other rescue workers and met local residents, according to the AP.
Imelda Marcos, wife of late dictator Ferdinand Marcos, arrived separately and kissed Arroyo on the cheek before the president left, according to the AP.
At least 16 villages in the area have been evacuated as officials fear other mountainsides could collapse. More than 2,700 people are in Red Cross evacuation centers, but at least 4,000 are believed to have left the area.
There are 1,037 people confirmed missing in Guinsaugon, following Friday’s mudslide, but Gordon said he expects that number to go up. Authorities believe about 1,875 people lived in the village on the island of Leyte before the disaster.
According to Gordon, only 85 bodies have been recovered. The National Bureau of Investigation has been called in for forensic examination.
Hopes were buoyed for a time on Monday as search teams thought they may have heard tapping noises, but later U.S. Marines involved in the search said they had found no evidence of signs of life. ( Watch why a doctor said offering hope would be cruel — 2:49)
A primary focus of the effort to find survivors in Guinsaugon village has been an elementary school, where 246 children and seven teachers were beginning their day’s lessons Friday at 9 a.m., when the 800-meter (2,625-foot) Mount Kanabag collapsed and tumbled into the sea-level village.
A police officer told officials he watched helplessly as the school, which held his wife and four children, was entombed "in seconds." ( Watch the massive swath of land the mud moved downhill — 1:26)
Rescuers believe the school is buried under about 30 meters of rubble, boulders and mud. The depth of the mud is making it impossible to use heavy equipment, such as tractors and bulldozers.
The Marines, digging in shifts of 40 men, tried to excavate a site where the school is believed to have been, but had to give up when holes they created kept collapsing.
Rescue specialists from Taiwan, Malaysia and Spain along with Philippine police, mine workers and members of the military are assisting in the search.
"As we’d dig deeper, we’d try to dig wider, but with the rain last night … there were little landslides happening around us," Lt. Jack Farley, who was heading the Marine contingent, told The Associated Press. "The soil here is so unstable."
It was also unclear if the scratching and tapping noises that were heard Monday came from survivors or just ground water or the mud settling.
"A few times we heard something, we think we heard something, because we really want to hear something," Farley said. "If there is anything at all, we’re gonna go there."
Accurate information was hard to come by, too.
"Even the local population has kind of lost their bearings," Farley said. "They don’t have those terrain features around to distinguish where something really is."
Although no survivors have been found since shortly after the mudslide on Friday, the Red Cross said the hunt for the living will go on despite the seemingly long odds.
"We will continue … for as long as the resources hold … and we intend to support … the effort to try and recover bodies," said Gordon.
Defense Secretary Avelino Cruz, who is leading the government’s rescue effort, said the governors and mayors had warned residents about the possibility of landslides after weather forecasters announced in early February that the "La Nina" effect would dump above-average rainfall in South Asia.
The area has been deluged with more than 50 centimeters of rain this month, about four times the maximum of any previous month, and the rains have continued since the mudslide.
Although some villagers had evacuated in anticipation of the flood threat, many had returned to participate in a village celebration Friday.
CNN’s Hugh Riminton contributed to this report.
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